Of course, every leap of progress should be accompanied by a little caution, but sometimes it feels as though we're far too willing to miss out on incredible improvements to our lives because we do not want to leave our comfort zone.

This morning, I sat at my computer and cried. I had just read the passing of someone called Joyce Tan Siew Ling who lived in Malaysia. Now, I am not the type to mourn the passing of lives from this world to the next. After all, we are all here on borrowed time, and Death was the only thing that was ever promised to us at birth. It comes to us all sooner or later.

By taking time to provide support, we help people when they most need it; we can help improve the health and wellbeing of carers and bereaved people; and we can build compassionate communities which show that - in the words of the Dying Well Community Charter - caring for one another at times of crisis and loss is everybody's responsibility.

I wrote in December about doing Christmas brilliantly. I hope everyone did and had a great time. Part of that ramble was saying that Christmas is an opportunity to end the year well and start a new one well. Ending something well has become a bit of a theme over the last few weeks for a number of reasons.

Paul was heartbroken when he heard his wife Susie had been killed in an accident, leaving behind their three small children. He'd been to plenty of funerals before and they just didn't seem to be relevant to the horror of the situation in which he found himself.

Generally speaking, Western culture shuns, fears and hides from death whenever possible. It is shrouded in mystery, and in fact, in secrecy to some extent. We don't like to discuss it at all, but when we must, we use euphemisms for it. We shield our children from it, we don't let them attend funerals...

Although it seems a lifetime ago, it feels like yesterday. Time doesn't heal; it just makes grief go out of focus. And anything can bring it sharply back again: a photograph, a scent, a memory or just the endless yearning pall of homesickness so familiar to people who've lost their parents too early.

While we do not have the disease, our own lives can become overshadowed and change. We may lose part of ourselves (hopes, aspirations, freedom, love and support) and a level of being care-free: without having to worry, without having to care for another.

Marie Curie works on its own and in partnership with a wide range of NHS, public and voluntary sector organisations to tackle many of the challenges highlighted in today's report. We want everyone, wherever they live to be able to have a 'good death', provided with the care they want and need, with support available for them and their families.

Although too often an afterthought, end of life costs should form a central part of this planning; a loved one passing away is a difficult enough time as it is, unattended and unexpected financial costs should not add further upset at a time when loved ones are grieving.